RECORDING
AUDIO‌‌

There are two main ways to hook up
recording hardware to your computer.

 Analog Mixer With Sound Card

The outputs of an analog mixer can
routed to a sound card’s stereo inputs. (This may require specific audio cables and/or adapters.) Once a mixer is
plugged into the sound card, microphones and other audio inputs are plugged into the analog mixer.

 Audio Interface

Firewire or USB audio interfaces
designed for music production are the best choice, as they are designed to handle high-quality recording and
playback of multiple audio channels. Many audio interfaces include high-quality mic preamps and instrument inputs.
Some also include MIDI input and output.

CHOOSING AN AUDIO DRIVER

The audio driver is the “go-between”
software that allows audio hardware to communicate with Mixcraft. Mixcraft supports three types of audio
drivers:

 ASIO

 WaveRT

 Wave

If you are playing virtual instruments
or want to live monitor, you’ll need to use a low latency setting along with audio hardware and a computer that are
up to the task. ASIO drivers usually offer the best performance, followed by WaveRT. If no other drivers are
supported, choose Wave.

RECORD ARMING

Arming a track simply means you’re
preparing it for recording. At this time, you’ll want to make sure the correct audio hardware input is selected and
recording level is optimally set. Don’t worry, it’s easy!

To arm a track, click
its Arm button; the button will turn red letting you know that the magic is about to happen.
You can also arm the current track with the key shortcut

CTRL+B.

Note:
If you’re using Core Audio/Wave RT or Wave audio drivers, the track volume fader will turn red as shown in the picture above. If you’re using the ASIO audio driver, the track volume fader will disappear. This is normal, and we’ll explain why a little later.

CHOOSING RECORDING INPUT

To select the hardware audio device
input for recording, click the selector arrow on the right side of the Arm button. You’ll see a list of all
available inputs from your audio device(s).

Select the device, followed by the
input that you’d like to arm for recording.

If you’re recording a
mono signal, click the sound device followed by Left or Right depending
on where you’ve plugged into your device. If you’re recording in stereo with left and right inputs, select Stereo. Pay close attention to this setting, because it’s easy to unnecessarily record
mono input sources (e.g., lead vocals, bass guitar, etc.) as a stereo file if you’ve set this incorrectly. It won’t
hurt anything, but you’ll unnecessarily use twice as much hard drive space.

After selecting the input, send some
audio through the input to verify that the correct input was chosen. You should see the meters moving on-screen in
the recording track.

SETTING THE RECORD INPUT LEVEL

When a track is armed, the volume
slider turns into a red recording level adjuster. Move the slider to adjust the recording input level. If peaks send
the meter into the red,

back off the level. Ideally, the input signal should
nominally sit in the yellow area.

Important Note: If
you’re using an audio device with an ASIO driver (you can check in File>Preferences>Sound Device),
the volume slider will disappear when the track is armed for recording. This is because ASIO recording drivers do
not support input level adjustment in software. To set the proper recording input level, you’ll need to use either
the input level on your audio hardware, or, if it doesn’t have one, the output level control on an external preamp
or channel strip. If you don’t have any of these, stand further away from the microphone.

(Just kidding!)

RECORDING MULTIPLE TRACKS SIMULTANEOUSLY

Multiple tracks can be armed
simultaneously if your sound device supports it. In this way, you can record an entire band in real-time, with each
input recording to a separate track, allowing far greater flexibility at mix time. Remember that you’ll need to set
the record input individually for each track.

In this example, we’re using a
FireStudio Project audio interface and would like to record one mono track through the left channel input. To choose
an input, click the Arm arrow for track 1. Click on the name of the audio interface; in our
case that will be

FireStudio Project, and choose Left Channel.

On the second track,
we’ll record the right channel input. Click the Arm arrow on track 2, followed by the name
of the audio interface, then choose Right Channel.

Both tracks are now armed for recording.

RECORD AN AUDIO CLIP

Once you have armed a track, you can
record clips.

1. Position the Caret for recording by clicking on the track.

2. Click the Record button on the transport control to start recording.

3. To stop recording, click the Record button again, or press the spacebar.

MONITOR/HEAR YOURSELF

To hear yourself with the channel’s
inserted effects, turn monitoring on by clicking the speaker icon after arming the audio track

LOOP RECORDING AND PUNCH IN/OUT

Record in loop mode or in a specific time section. To learn more about
loop recording or punch in/out see
"Recording Audio", pg. 111.

RECORDING MODE

There are three
recording modes, selectable by right-clicking or by clicking

Track>Recording Mode
in the Main Window menus.

 Takes  Overdub  Replace

Default recording modes for audio and
MIDI can be independently set in

Preferences>Recording
in the Main Window menus.

 Takes

Takes mode is very useful for laying
down multiple performances without starting and stopping each time. It’s generally used in conjunction with Loop
Mode wherein a section is looped and each cycle records a new “take” (see Loop Recording below).
Mixcraft automatically creates recording Lanes to accommodate each pass.

As new takes are recorded, the clips
of previous recording passes are automatically

muted. Audio tracks default to Takes
mode. Take clips can freely be moved to their own audio tracks.

When Takes mode is used in conjunction
with punch in/out, it creates a clip on a

new lane in the punch area, but only
mutes the portion of the audio clips in the punch area.

 Overdub

In this mode, all previous clips are
heard during recording. Virtual Instrument

(MIDI) tracks
default to Overdub mode. This works well for quickly stacking parts. Each new recording is placed on a new lane.

 Replace

In this mode, existing audio is
replaced by new recordings. New lanes are

Saving Time With a
Multi-Input

Recording Template

A project
with the correct inputs and armed tracks for multiple-input recording can be set up and saved as a project template.
This is handy if you’re recording an entire band – the next time you record the band, simply load the template and
all inputs will be ready to go!

(Provided
all instruments and inputs are plugged into the same inputs… keep notes!)

not created.

 Loop Recording

Loop recording allows recording of
multiple takes or overdubs without stopping the transport.

To create a loop, click the Loops mode button in the Transport, then drag the Loop Start and
Loop End markers in the Timeline to set a loop area.

 Punch In/Out

Punch In/Out recording lets place
markers that define where to start and end

recording.

Be a Loop Mode Ninja!

A faster
way to set loop points is to drag a purple highlight area either in the Timeline or Main Clip Grid, then click the
Loop button.

This automatically sets
the in and out points to the beginning and end of the highlight region. (You can also use the

L key shortcut to toggle
loop mode on and off.) Remember that the Snap setting affects where the loop region markers land; we recommend
setting this to Snap To Grid